Rock Band

My weekend adventures have further demonstrated to me that I have zero coordination.  I played Rock Band with my friend Elg on the weekend, which we somehow managed to do for 5 straight hours, only stopping when I basically was like, I should go home, it's 1am!

I used to be really good on DDR (that's Dance Dance Revolution to you gaming ignants) so I thought that on a similar rhythm game I'd be decent. I was ok on the guitar, and that was tons of fun (especially Bon Jovi's Living on a Prayer and [artist forgotten]'s Smoke On the Water). But in the last hour I thought I'd have a go on the drums and I was DISMAL. particularly, I just could NOT get the hang of alternating between hand and foot. the foot petal might as well have been on another planet. I even tried AFTER the song with zero pressure to alternate Right hand, Foot, Left Hand, Foot, and somehow I kept on trying to do my left hand at the foot petal at the same time. It's almost as if my left hand was like - em, I usually go after the right hand, why isn't it my turn yet? What's going on? Which just goes to show me that I do absolutely nothing that requires coordination of my arms and legs. It makes sense because I play no sport, and even when I drag myself off to do some sort of exercise, it's running. It's also making sense to me now that even when sometimes I try the stair climber machines at the gym, I find it hard to get into the rhythm. My arms and legs simply refuse to talk to each other!!!!

I wonder if that is a dormant part of my brain which, from lack of use, is causing me serious mental harm from the cobwebs that seem to cover it?

This Week's Lunch and More Fish Out of Water Stories

Well, let's start with the fish out of water story first. Fish out of water is my new euphemism for whenever I act like a caveman and don't follow societal norms that all grown fully functioning adults are meant to know and understand, purely because I have forgottem them in the last 7 years.

....... Today the bus drive had to teach me how to get off the bus.

I still remembered how to pull the string for the bell to indicate next stop. Pretty proud of myself there. And I was still playing Scramble as it pulled up to the curb. Then I stood there at the door. We were at the stop, but the door hadn't opened. I looked up at the driver, then thought, em, maybe he hasn't pulled up to his sweet spot yet. And then he shouted down the length of the bus "push on the door handle!" So I did. And the doors then opened. I stepped out, embarassed, only just remembering to shout back "THANK YOU!" at the bus driver, which people will often do here even when they haven't had to have special needs instructions to GET OFF THE BUS.

What a dufis.

Let's have a look at this week's lunch menu, and how I'm doing on avoiding all the nice food and eating only the salad!

Week of June 11

Monday
 ·         Greek Grilled Chicken
·         Braised Lentils
·         Lemon Potatoes
·         Greek Salad
·         Spinach Salad w White Beans
·         Pita & Tzsasikki

May's self-score: 7.5/10. Had a bit of tzatziki and the pita was a carb and a little greasy and there was feta on the salad. Didn't eat any potatoes tho! (p.s. those are my own celery and carrots, yes, from 3 weeks ago when I bought them with my cute Grandma! They were pretty dry)

Tuesday

 Steamrollers

May's self-score: 0/10. The steamroller is a burrito. and it was big. There were no side salads. I ate it all and I LOVED IT. Also, had a coke. When I am bad, I go all bad.


Wednesday

·         Indian Butter Chicken
·         Channa Dahl with Chickpeas and Coconut Milk
·         Coconut Roasted Cauliflower
·         Steamed Scented Basmati Rice
·         Raita
·          Garden Salad
·         Grilled Naan

 May's self-score: 8/10. Only had one piece of the butter chicken and 10 chick peas. There were mozza balls in the salad though. And that's a Tim Horton's french vanilla cappucino you see up in the corner of my monitor. Ate a banana for fruit, that's good right?

Thursday

  tba
   
Friday

Sandwiches and Salad

TBA for Thursday! I can't deal with that kind of unknown! Friday I'll be good - even going to peel the bread off the sandwiches and just eat turkey on top of the salads.

However, what isn't helping is the breakfasts I'm having and the dinners. Tonight was poutine at La Belle Patate, check out their menu! I got tired of reading by the second board and Clara and I got one traditional and one  La Belle, with smoked meat and beef :

Mmmm poutine. For all you ignants, that's fries*, gravy, and cheese curds. Nothing says mmm mmm good like the word curd. it's reminiscent of curdle, which is horrible, but I guess that's what cheese is.

Have downloaded the Calorie King on my ipod to make me feel bad about the poutine and control my DIET.

*If I'm explaining poutine to you, you must be English, and therefore I should have said chips. But I'm converting back, guys. I'm converting back. They are FRIES.

Bad driver

I really should not be allowed to drive!! I am sooo out of practice and I never had any spatial ability anyway (yea that curb is way far away...CRUNCH), but driving everyday and everywhere to do audits for years helped me get to a passable skill level, and I was confident. Now, I am a mess, yet I slide back into the comfort and alertness that I used to employ, resulting in some near disasters already.

I have already managed to scratch both cars - mine and my parents. Pulling into the garage, thought i had plenty of space between my front left bumper and the parked car's rear right bumper. Nope. scraaaaaaaaaaaaatch. on both cars. don't care about mine, i own that car so no guilt necessary, but not so nice on my mom and dad's car. Oops.

Then today I had a mild panic when I started the car up, looked at the dashboard, and was faced with this:

There's no GAS! THERE'S NO GAS!!! PANIC!!!! I had noticed the tank was getting close to empty over the past week, and each time just thought - I better gas up soon, and then neglected to do it on account of sheer laziness. And I'll admit it - I was a little afraid of the gas station. I've forgotten how most things work and feel a bit like a fool. Even though it is full service in Richmond (you can't fill it yourself, strange by-law in our suburb) I'd still put it off. And now it was on the E line! Noooooooooooooo. I'd never experienced this before because anal retentive me in the past would never risk it getting that low. I don't even ever remember seeing this orange light go on - I'd fill it back up well before this point each time. But I fought the panic and told myself they always leave a bit of leeway so you don't get stuck, and then used my new Gas Buddy app (thanks Elaine!) to find the nearest gas station, and set off. Made it, and was relieved that I could take this picture aftewards:

All full. yay. No idea what that other light is about. Is the car telling me I have a ball in my lap? Whatever. I'll ignore that one.

Baby steps, May, baby steps. Next, I will work up the nerve to fill up outside of Richmond and self-serve. You can do it May, you used to do it all the time.

First Real Post: Rant #1

My first real post is a RANT. Surprise!!

When I turned to Keith tonight and said "I'm going to start a blog", he laughed at me. Then he asked me what my blog was going to be about. I responded that I didn't think it had to be about only one theme or thing in particular, and that it was for my friends (again, please God don't let this whole venture reveal that I don't have any) to read.

Let me make it clear, I do not have any intellectual interests (or even interests) strong enough to warrant an entire blog with the same theme, unless you want me to write reviews of every single episode of the 7 seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation that we are currently plowing through (Status: currently on season 6 of 7, am enjoying it, but not as much as Stargate SG:1). No one wants that. So, this blog will not be about politics, or religion, or current events, because I know nothing of any of those topics. If there is any theme at all, it will be that I will often RANT about something.

Rant #1: The incompetence of [real estate agent name withheld - code name ABC]

The following is a true story:

12 March - email landlord to let him know we are giving our two months notice on our flat, to vacate on 15 May. He responds to acknowledge and lets us know that he'll get in touch with ABC so they can line up some new tenants

13-14 March- calls 4 times a day from James and Liam, real estate agents from ABC bugging us about keys, taking pictures, letting people in to look at the flat.

20 March- receive letter from Claire at ABC asking us if we would like to renew our tenancy since it is due to expire on 15 June

21 March  - receive email from Claire at ABC asking us if we got her letter

21 March 1 hour later - yours sincerely sends snippy email to Claire telling her we gave notice 10 days earlier and have had at least 3 couples traipse through our flat, let in by her colleagues, so no we will not be renewing. And who should I contact about getting our deposit back when we exit the property?

26 March - receive legal documents from Zoe at ABC saying Claire has let her know we are exiting our tenancy early, and that we are to sign the attached documents acknowledging that we are responsible for the rent until they are able to find new tenants.

WHAT? NO. That is not what is in our contract. Our contract says we give two months notice and we don't have to give a sh*t how long it takes you to find new tenants after we vacate

26 March 3 minutes later - yours sincerely is writing long winded email directly to landlord worriedly asking for an explanation as to why ABC think we have to pay rent for as long as he can't find tenants. Thankfully, before sending...

26 March 3.5 minutes later - receive another email from Zoe at ABC, quote "Dear May, many apologies, I have just realised that your property is not managed by ABC! Your landlord will manage your property exit and will let us know when to return your deposit"

In conclusion, every single person at ABC is SH*T at their jobs. How can the entire ABC organisation still be functioning? Worse, I have been to their office, which is right on our street. There are literally 4 desks in that entire office. Which means that these 4 a-holes that I have dealt with throughout this entire saga... sit right next to each other.

Next up... recruiters.